Opinion: Seeking secure health information exchange

In healthcare IT security, there are lots of villains to contend with, but the heroes also deserve attention. The New York eHealth Collaborative (NYeC) is among several that come to mind. NYeC's stated goal is simple enough: Improve the healthcare of all New Yorkers through the creation of the statewide health information network for New York, an endeavor they call SHIN-NY. In reviewing the numerous data breaches that have plagued US hospitals and practices, one of the missteps that surfaces over and over among offending providers is the unwillingness to do a detailed risk assessment before their records were breached.